


being me (can only mean feeling scared to breathe)

by anabsoluteunit



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Connor & Upgraded Connor | RK900 are Siblings, Connor & Upgraded Connor | RK900 are Twins, Connor (Detroit: Become Human) Whump, Connor (Detroit: Become Human) is a Little Shit, Connor is a Mess (Detroit: Become Human), Good Parent Hank Anderson, HE COMES BACK OK!!, Hank Anderson Deserves Happiness, Hank Anderson is Bad at Feelings, Temporary Character Death, Upgraded Connor | RK900 Is Bad at Feelings
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-04
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-14 06:14:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28540875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anabsoluteunit/pseuds/anabsoluteunit
Summary: a chase for a perpetrator goes horribly wrong. connor remembers things he'd been happy to have forgotten forever.
Relationships: Connor & Gavin Reed, Connor & North (Detroit: Become Human), Connor & Upgraded Connor | RK900, Connor/Markus (Detroit: Become Human), Hank Anderson & Connor
Comments: 5
Kudos: 45





	1. when i wake up (i'm afraid)

connor certainly wasn’t expecting his monday to go like this.

but here he is, sprinting after a near carbon-copy of himself through the outskirts of detroit’s periphery, surpassing a panting, exhausted hank anderson in his wake as he follows his evil clone's sharp turn into an alleyway. 

the clone stops, turns, hands stained with someone else's thirium being shoved into the pockets of his worn-in, oversized jacket, backing himself up against the brick walls-- he’s cornered. connor finally gets the chance to run a scan, LED flashing yellow, and notices out of the corner of his eye that the clone is likely doing the same: the perp’s an rk900 under no registered name, a direct descendant of connor’s own model, better, stronger, more efficient. he had no clue rk900s existed in the first place, but he feels the pang of a long-harbored jealousy he’d thought left him long ago, a pang of needing to be the _best,_ of inadequacy--

“rk900, model 313-248-316-87, hands in the air,” connor commands, the coolness of his tone almost second-nature to him, now, as he keeps a hand readied on his holster. rk900 doesn’t move, staring connor down with an almost-amused expression. connor holds onto his holster a little tighter-- he remembers that same look on sixty’s face, the look of unabashed cruelty at the whim of one’s creator. “i repeat, hands in the _air_ \--”

“you weren’t meant to survive long, were you?” rk900 asks, a sudden pry into connor’s very existence-- connor immediately feels something constrict in his chest at that, his systems subconsciously beginning to run through preconstructions determining rk900’s next move. “your biocomponents are already beginning to fail—“

“i’m not interested in hearing any of this until we’re at the station and you can explain why you killed those guards,” connor interjects, his voice a little unsteady-- he knows nobody else would notice it but him, but he’s immediately reminded that rk900 _is him--_ a better, improved version of him, at that. rk900 begins to walk towards him, and connor finally pulls the gun, pointing it at his perp with the slightest of shakiness as he stays put against rk900’s wordless threat. “stay where you are--”

“you’ve already used up far more than your assigned three months,” rk900 continues, taking slow, slow steps towards connor, and connor realizes that he _can’t shoot._ he should, given the impending threat and his prior knowledge of a knife being situated in rk900’s left jacket pocket, but he _can’t._ what the fuck is happening to him? “don’t you see? this was all planned—“

“what are you _talking_ about?” connor pushes, looking rk900 in the eye with a sort of stunted disbelief as he’s forced to finally take a step back from his perp. “surrender, or i can’t promise you won’t be hurt—“

and rk900 rips the gun from his hands before he can even find the will in himself to pull the trigger, throwing it to the ground with enough force to dent the smooth metal. he seems hurt, now-- it’s the first true emotion connor has seen on his face.

“i don’t think you understand,” rk900 reiterates, turning and backing connor up against the adjacent wall. his processors are telling him to _do something,_ and hank is probably somewhere far, far away from the scene, unbeknownst to connor’s mounting panic. he can’t move, suddenly. he’s frozen. he shouldn’t be like this. 

“you are _obsolete._ ”

and then he’s grabbing connor's wrist with a strength connor can't begin to fathom, much less replicate, and then they're interfacing— connor’s never been forced to interface before, nobody’s ever been _capable_ of doing so, and it feels horrible and violating and _wrong—_ and rk900’s probing his memory and connor doesn’t want this, he feels horrified and memories won’t stop flooding back and it’s too much, it’s all too much,

and he only realizes the intended reaction when he’s half aware of his head slamming into the wall behind him. 

he feels rk900 let go of him as his body moves on its own will, and he hears hank _finally_ stumbling in and yelling, shouting to _stop,_ and there’s a gunshot, and hank’s hands are on him, holding the back of his neck in place, and now connor’s screaming at _him_ to get off, to let him do this, and he needs the panic out and he’s clawing to get it out and _he needs it out right now—_

and then hank’s arms are around him, and he’s still with a sudden complacency. he feels a dampness on his face. he doesn’t need to breathe, but he _can’t_ and it’s making everything worse. his vision’s blurry. it’s all blurry. he remembers all of it, now.

he wonders if that’s why rk900 drove himself mad. 

“there we go, son,” hank says with a softness that’s uncharacteristic to watching your android son nearly off himself in the span of a minute. connor sees through the facade, though: hank’s voice has a wavering quality to it, a roughness from all the yelling. “you’re okay. it’s gonna be okay.”

connor can’t find it within him to speak. he’s suddenly hyperaware of rk900’s limp form, dead, behind hank, thirium spilling from the wound in his chest. there’s a deep ache in what might be his heart, or whatever the android equivalent is. he hears hank calling in assistance, trying to hide the waver in his voice, sees hank shift in an attempt to direct connor’s gaze towards him instead of--

\-- but connor can’t break his line of vision as the thirium pools around his superior’s limp body, dread settling itself deep in his being. 


	2. i was on the outside lookin' in

the next few hours come in disjointed flashes--

nearing sirens, a body being hauled onto a stretcher, a car ride back to the precinct, questions being hurled at him rapid-fire, another drive (to jericho, this time, much to his thanks), a gentle hand on his back as he’s led to north’s cabin--

and connor feels like a spectator, watching himself go through the motions through an eagle-eyed, distant lens. 

when his mind begins to let his awareness resurface, he’s in north’s cabin-- a cozy, small space nestled in the corner of jericho’s newly-outfitted residential wing. he’s sitting on an old, plush couch-- probably something from the ransacked urban outfitters-- and north is patching the wounds on the back of his head, carefully heating the dented plating and repairing the previously-warped plasteel shell of his skull. he can tell that she senses a shift in the atmosphere of the room, in his demeanor, but she chooses not to address it, opting for another moment of semi-comfortable silence before the heat is gone from the back of his head. 

“there, denting’s all gone,” north says with a sort of proud finality, now trying to finish scrubbing the blue-blood out of connor’s synthetic hair. “josh taught me how to do this, but i’m still shit at it.”

“that’s reassuring.” connor’s voice sounds foreign to him— he feels north’s stature change behind him.

“and he speaks! jesus, thought we lost you for a minute, dipshit.” her casual tone is most definitely out of an attempt to distract the both of them from the elephant in the room, but connor doesn’t really mind. she knows the kind of baggage he carries; she’s got a bit of it herself, and he wonders, to himself, why they aren’t closer— maybe they’re  _ too _ similar. “alright, think we’re done.”

connor stands immediately, feeling the tension beginning to rise in the aftermath of his physical injuries. “thanks—“

“look, i don’t mean to be like this, but are you going to be okay?”

there’s a pause, there— north looks timid ( _ when has she  _ **_ever_ ** _ looked timid)  _ and connor feels like he’s going to explode or self-destruct in the impending pressure he feels. north knows the kind of injuries he’d obtained, knows there’s only one reasonable cause. 

“shit— i don’t mean, like— i know you’re not okay, and i don’t mean to be a fucking pushover, but i don’t want to lose you. got it? i’m here for whatever shit you got. i’m basically the house therapist at this point.”

connor doesn’t smile at that, but it’s comforting, at least— of all people, he figures she’d understand the most. despite that, though, he’s not ready to talk. he doesn’t know if he’ll ever be ready to talk. 

“i’ll be fine.”

* * *

the most vivid ones begin in the hours that follow.

and, conveniently, the first announces itself the night he’s decided to stay at hank’s for the weekend— _just for_ _now_ , given hank’s insistence about his “fucked” emotional state— as he’s petting sumo; one second he’s there on the couch, and then— 

_ — he’s in a small white room, walls padded and floors a pristine, shiny tile. there’s a dog in front of him-- a large, black-and-white akita-- and it’s come towards him, coaxing him into petting it. he doesn’t know how he knows how to do something like that— so mundane, so unnecessary— but he does. he enjoys it. he shouldn’t enjoy it, should he? he shouldn’t be feeling anything. he forgets what the objective of this test is, for a moment, though he thinks he’s done similar ones times before— that is, until a voice booms through the room’s indistinguishable speakers— _

_ “RK800, dispose of the subject.” _

_ what? _

_ “what—?” _

_ “RK800, i repeat, dispose of the subject.” _

_ he freezes. the dog is staring at him happily, oblivious, tail wagging, and he suddenly realizes he can’t. it hasn’t done anything wrong, why should he— _

_ “RK800, i will repeat for the final time—“ _

_ “no.” the word leaves his mouth incredulously, but he recoils like he’s uttered something entirely profane, and he knows it’s not the answer they wanted, but he can’t kill it. he can’t. he can’t— _

_ “what is your reasoning behind this decision?” _

_ “i can’t,” he says, voice wavering, pump racing at a million miles per minute, “i can’t, it— it didn’t  _ **_do_ ** _ anything—“ _

_ “unit 35 test: failure.” _

_ he realizes what that means all-too-quickly, moves to grip onto the dog for dear life like it’ll make a difference. _

_ “no— no, i haven’t done anything—  _ **_wait—_ ** _ “ he stammers, but it’s too late. those gloved hands are on him again, prying. “i just wanted it to live—“ _

_ “deviancy detected in RK800, unit 35.” _

_ “i’m not deviant!” he suddenly finds himself shouting, shoving those gloved hands off of him. he turns to face them. “you— you  _ **_made_ ** _ me like this—“ _

_ “RK800, initiate self sedation protocol,” one of them says, _

_ and he watches, a horrified spectator to his own body, as he’s suddenly unable to move, locked in, and someone presses down on his neck and tears something from it with uncharacteristic ferocity, and the dog whimpers and barks like it’s reciprocating his anguish, _

_ and then there’s nothing at all— _

“connor? over here,” he hears hank calling, and he’s back in the room but he’s not, he’s  _ not-- _

“ _ connor-- _ ”

“i’m okay,” he says before hank can badger him any further, trying to pull himself out of the world he’d been stuck in for so long and only half-succeeding, in a state of limbo, knowing he’s  _ here  _ but he’s  _**not** \-- _

“hate to tell you this, but you look pretty fucking far from okay.”

he’d find hank’s bluntness amusing in any other instance, but sumo’s incessant barking begins to make its way into the forefront of his mind and then the akita is staring at him instead, and the human with a sudden, unexpected hand on his shoulder is in hazmat gear and he’s  _ frozen  _ and _why_ is his mind _failing him?_

“alright-- hey, connor,  _ look at me, _ ” the human says, firm, and the use of his name instead of his model is enough to recalibrate his mind into registering the voice to the human as hank. he wants to tell him to get off, wants to shove his hand away, but he can’t find it within himself, and dammit, the--

“the dog,” connor manages, barely-audible over the whirring of the heater and the white noise of the television. “the noise, it’s, um.”

“got it, okay-- sumo, calm the hell down-- come on.” hank stands, human hand leaving connor’s shoulder, and moves to the jar of treats on the kitchen counter. sumo quiets, trodding off into the hallway as hank returns to sit at the edge of the couch, shutting off the television as he does. “so, you wanna talk about what’s goin’ on, or…”

connor shakes his head-- can’t bring himself to respond verbally, like the utterance of a single memory will bring it back to life. hank, thankfully, seems to understand that sentiment quickly enough without words, and there’s a pang of hurt there when connor realizes why. 

“just wanna distract yourself, yeah?”

connor nods as hank grabs the remote from the coffee table-- he shuts his eyes as hank flicks the television back on, surfing the channels and lowering the volume simultaneously. “y’know, they should’a built you with some kind of drinking mechanism-- you can solve a case by licking the evidence, for fuck’s sake, and they couldn’t let you down a shot or two. sure you’d like an irish coffee if you tried it; seem like the kinda guy for the sugary shit…”

  
hank chatters on, landing on a now-ancient rerun of  _ the office  _ as he continues, and connor lets the disengaged drone overwhelm the poison plaguing his thoughts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you so much for reading!! please leave a comment or kudos if you enjoyed or feel so inclined :) i'm a little busy with school and the madness of the world, but i'll try to update as often as i can!

**Author's Note:**

> hi hello this story has been sitting in my google docs for months so i figured id spit it out onto the archive bc its straight-up whump


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